48 Trying a Shortcu

The number of people trying to enter the city of Archet at dawn was quite low, but still enough to probably make someone wait a bit. Unless that very someone was carrying an immense bloody head in his hand and was towering at least one meter above the rest of the small humans. Even a group of adventurers that were all so tired that one was literally sleep-walking still made way for Davion to bypass them. As for the guards, they dared not stop someone that managed to kill the monster that had such a terrifying snakehead.

The rest of the walk inside the city was provoking more or less the same effect and a few citizens immediately closed their door the moment they saw the dark armor moving with his scary package. The smiling and happy adventurers nearby stopped what they were doing and just looked at them. Among them, a few were present the precedent day and even mocked the pitiful weaklings that only had money at their sides. They discreetly turned back and decided to wander in the town before entering the guild.

Inside the building, another receptionist that was a lot more professional and calm, without relentlessly showing her huge assets in front of everyone. She was wearing a robe that was vaguely similar to one that magicians wore. Even if she was not extremely beautiful and didn't provoke the stares of all the horny males around her, she still had a huge amount of work and in this time of the day, many groups were ready to leave. Provoking a small period of waiting before she could answer her request, from validating an increase of rank to giving more precisions about some notices.

Because of this and the fact that she was not present yesterday, she only glanced at Davion and Meridiana and still maintained her full attention to the two kids in front of her. They were still trying to negotiate a lower price for the passage at the D-rank and only had a little less than 3 gold coins. To be more precise, they had 2 gold coins and 89 silver coins. The principle of coins was based on the fact that it needed 100 lower coins for 1 superior one. Therefore, they had 28 900 copper coins, that could look incredible. Until you realized that it was not even 3 gold coins and at the moment, the two children required 4. The succubus and the orodil arrived just at the time where they were losing hope.

"You know us, it had been more than a year that we are doing small errands every day, but the salary is just too low. No one even accepts us in D-quest because of it, please, can you just lend us one coin, we will pay back, for sure, Hey, tell her too." The bigger of the two kids pinched the smaller one. They were both boys, but one looked clearly uncomfortable doing that. But under the pressure, he still murmured some words.

"Please, just one gold and in thre … two months we will repay you back. Promise."

"See, please." Even as they tried to look as miserable as they could, the impassive receptionist was clearly not listening at all. If it was the one from the last day, maybe that pitiful plead could have worked, but not the day they chose. She was raising her eyes to the heavens when she saw something falling toward her. Dumbfounded, a huge thing ended up on her desk, splattering some red liquid everywhere. Only after touching her cheek that received it did she realized that it was blood. Examining the thing in front of her, she had a very hard time figuring out what it was. Turning her head, she saw the smallest iron armor getting closer while apologizing.

"Sorry, the wrong direction, here you go." The voice of a woman resonated and she turned the object to face the receptionist. The latter screamed at the sight of the terrifying snake ready to pounce on her. At first, the face smashed on the desk and she only saw the scaly back, but now, the eyes of the monster were scaring the poor woman. They were frozen in the same state as a predator feasting on a prey and a dark light was still present inside them. That disturbing scream still provoked the interest of everyone and all noticed the head nearly as big as the two children nearby.

For Davion and Meridiana, it was perfect. For the first time, they were the center of the attention for a very good reason and not like previously. The head even shocked the receptionist, but maybe it was because of how they did it. They head the numerous humans and non-humans gossiping, trying to figure out the origin of the monster and where was the rest of the body. At the same time, a few pondered who asked for such a strange trophy, and all of those that wondered about that were not present during the previous visit of the foreigners.

"WHAT IS HAPPENING?" A big bad man suddenly appeared, and he looked angrily at everyone. He was getting ready for his morning routine and just finished stretching himself when he heard a woman screaming. After that, he saw the two wealthy greenhorns and the head on the desk. At first, he thought it was one of the more known groups that slew that monster, but there were only four people near the trophy, two strange people and two children. And he was even less convinced that the two kids did it.

"Oy, you two, explain yourself!" Pointing specifically at Davion, he ordered some explanations from them. Not everyone had the guts to enter like that here.

"Simple, we decided to skip some ranks. And this …" She showed the big head. "… is our proof. I don't really know how strong the monster was, but it should still be enough for something like rank J? Maybe K? I am not certain." The succubus was still wearing her helmet, otherwise, the old man would have seen the huge sarcastic smile she wore while saying those sentences. All her anger for what she experienced, she decided to use this opportunity to completely vent it.

Her foolish demands were still badly received, even when many admired them for slaying such a big threat. Even without the complete body, they were still able to guess that the creature wouldn't be smaller than the biggest member of that strange group of two. But that entire thing about disregarding the usual rules was provoking quite a lot of adventurers to personally discipline those two rookies. Without even letting the respected old man inspect in detail the head, one female wearing a tight leather armor left the crowd and shouted at Meridiana.

"Yesterday, you presented yourself grandly, acting mighty and such. But when it was time for you to drop your armor and weapons, you backed off. Just look at you, you are saying that you killed that monster, why is there no traces of that battle on you? No marks left by a claw, no corrosion or burnt area, your sword and daggers are without a gap on them. Instead of you killing it, I bet that you just paid someone to do it. How many died just for you to have this? Three? More?"

The more she talked, the stronger the resentment of the adventurers grew. What was disappointment and irritation turned into disgust and anger. The more they thought about it, the more the sound of the woman in leather armor sounded right. Nothing on either the two proved that they even fought once. It was even the contrary, the possibility of someone paying a group of adventurers to do their dirty job and then steal the glory happened a lot in the past. It was mainly some nobles and wealthy men, eager to prove their strength.

Not feeling bothered at all by that, the succubus slowly walked toward the shouting human, without the latter even noticing it. The woman was still talking to the crowd and only when the metallic hand flew toward her cheek did she realized her mistake. She had supposed that those two won't dare to move in front of them, but Meridiana only wanted to be done with it.

SLAP

The supposedly female thief was projected on the ground violently and it took her a few seconds before she held her head in her hands and dared to look at the succubus. Feeling the vicious gaze of the humans, the demon commandant extended her arms like she wanted to give a hug and taunted them.

"If you think that you are so much better than us, come and prove it!" If it was said ten seconds earlier, a wave of adventurers would have swarmed them. But the woman that was hit was one of the highest ranked adventurers in that city and the fact that even she didn't manage to dodge a slap proved something. But some fools still had their pride getting in the way.

"You hit our friend, so be it. We can duel you 1 by 1 if you want or maybe you will be stupid enough to allow us to work as a team. Since apparently, you don't even put us in your eyes, why should we be polite?" A man in a sturdy armor extended his hand and helped the woman on the ground getting up. Behind him, four humans and an elf were seen looking hatefully at Meridiana. None of them expected that by this beautiful and warm morning, they would be insulted by strangers like that.

"Depend, are you scared of losing or not? But don't worry, whatever you choose won't make a single difference in the end." She couldn't help but taunt them more after she remembered that this elf was here yesterday and was part of the mocking crew. That long ears will eat grass before she left the building, she promised that to herself. But her words enraged, even more, everyone and the leader of that group even lost a bit of his temper.

"Fine, just so you know before you beg our forgiveness, you are facing the …"

"Don't care." Without even continuing that masquerade, the moment she cut the knight, the elf aimed at her and fired an arrow. For the onlookers, it was extremely hard to see that fast shot, but it was a joke for the two aliens in that room. She only raised her hand on the way of the arrow and the deadly projectile only destroyed itself on her armor. Not even a dent was made on the metal fused with C'Thalium, provoking an enormous clamor. They realized that this flexible iron was comparable to the scales of many monsters and maybe even as resistant as the ones from a dragon.

Not backing off, the elf took some of his best quality arrows. Without even letting his leader stop him, three arrows surrounded by a blue light were shot in less than a second. While it was not the best quality available, each of those arrows still cost 10 gold. The old man looked with horror at the scene in front of him, not knowing how the situation ended up like that. In his mind, the woman was already dead.

What happened was expected only by the orodil that didn't move since the beginning. The three arrows were grabbed by Meridiana that threw them to her companion, for future researches. With those and the monster's corpse, Malakov and Agnil will have some work to do. Profiting from the stunned state of everyone, she bypassed the warriors in front of her and grabbed the neck of the elf.

It happened too fast for anyone else to react and the group of adventurers had no choice but to look helplessly at their companion. With the fact that she caught those arrows, it was now clear that she could probably kill him before they even began their assault. And to die for such a foolish reason, no one from that side wanted that. But to their horror, instead of pressuring them with her hostage, she only looked at the old man and asked a question.

"Hey old man, what are the rules for someone attempting to the life of someone else around here?" Everyone realized that it won't end well this time but even the previously menacing elder had to say the rules loudly. Even if he tried to excuse the actions of the elf, he still attempted at the life of the stranger and if she wasn't that strong, she would have died. So it was logical for her to have a grudge about it.

"In that case, one could be locked by the local militia and judged by the lord." He didn't say that the victim could make justice by herself since he had no intention of losing anyone today. And because of the helmet, he couldn't see if that irrational woman trusted his words. After a few second where no one talked, she finally released the archer. Using her hand, she cleaned his shoulders of any dust and began to walk toward the exit. She turned around one last time, before staring at the elf that suddenly got his entire back drenched with cold sweats.

"Fine, but we'll be back. As for you, long ears, don't die before I get my hand you. See you soon."